


Sundered

by emmerwrites



Series: Echoes [1]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet, F/M, Female Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers, Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers Spoilers, Gen, Hopeful angst, Hurt/Comfort, Magical Illness, Original Character(s), Platonic Cuddling, Platonic Soulmates, Soulmates, blatant use of in-game dialogue, freeform prose, lightwarden aether is bad for your health, touch-starved on main, unless....
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2020-07-21
Packaged: 2020-10-10 00:49:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20519240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emmerwrites/pseuds/emmerwrites
Summary: Two-toned echoes, tumbling through time.A collection of short pieces exploring the relationship between Ardbert and my Warrior of Light/Darkness during the Shadowbringers MSQ. These stories feature my OC Alyx Vance, and are a mix of her POV and Ardbert's. Currently contains spoilers through 5.0 and lots of complicated feelings.





	1. take my arms that I might reach you

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted as separate works, and for some reason I thought I got it all out of my system.... I absolutely did not. Beware, for there may be more to come.

_Take my words that I might teach you,_  
_Take my arms that I might reach you._  
_\- Simon and Garfunkel, "The Sound of Silence"_

* * *

“I had been afraid to do anything more than watch for fear of making things even worse,” Ardbert said, and Alyx realized that she, too, had been afraid. 

She had so much to tell him, but there was so much of it she couldn’t. For as fond of talk and as skilled she was with languages, the only language they lacked was touch. Alyx thought it passing strange how crippling that felt–perhaps it was something she took for granted in all of her friendships. Perhaps she never realized the true gravity of being able to place a steadying hand on one’s shoulder, or draw one close to lean onto hers; how had she never realized what essential communication existed in an embrace? How had she not realized how much she spoke without her words? She knew it well with Aymeric, and she knew it well when they were apart. Yet this was not a lover’s touch she felt silenced and stifled without, it was something else.

Ardbert was something else.

Her heart had ached for him even when they were enemies: ached for the guilt, for the loss, for the kind of helplessness only she could truly fathom. It was a sadness and a depth of understanding unlike any other, one that grew with renewed vigor ever since their reunion on the First. How could she possibly tell him how she felt? How could she tell him that for the first time, despite the loneliness that followed her everywhere, his voice and his haunting of her room made her feel that for the first time she was not alone?

Maybe he knew. Maybe it wasn’t necessary. Even still, there were times when all Alyx wanted to do was take his hand.

He was waiting for her when her hands were stained–stained so bright even Y’shtola hadn’t recognized her, a thought that still made heat grow behind her eyes. From the depths of the wood she returned to the solitude of her room and when she looked down at her palm through light-clouded eyes, she let the hero’s smile crack.

“And what if that changes? What if it overwhelms me?”

_What if I’m not strong enough? What if I fail?_

And she wasn’t. She did. The light poured through her open window as a constant reminder while she sat awake on the edge of her bed. She could have closed the blinds again, but couldn’t deny the treacherous sky above, nor the sickness that glowed inside her. She couldn’t deny she was a villain who hid in plain sight of those she failed to save.

They needed her. Everyone needed her. Everyone in this world, and her own. And yet..

She felt more like a chained monster than a hero. She was a threat, and a barely useful one–a fraction of her former strength under forced caution and control. _For gods’ sake_, she thought bitterly, _I can’t even use an aetheryte without fear of the strain._

And certainly not the Ocular’s path to the Source. Alyx dared not entertain what could happen were she to attempt traversing the rift in this state.

_“I had been afraid to do anything more than watch for fear of making things even worse”_ she heard Ardbert’s words again._ “But no longer.”_

He had reached for her twice now. The first time had almost hurt from the surprise of it. The second was affirmation, however brief. The distance remained and Alyx’s starvation for something, anything–anything to make her feel human, to feel unlike an abomination self-contained–

Anything to ease the suffering of another after all the pain she had caused–

The third time had yet to follow, so this time Alyx reached for him, and then suddenly there he was beside her, as he always was, but truly _there_: not a vision of her mind but a man, a man whose edges seemed soft but whose eyes she could no longer see through to the wall behind him. His skin was supple and soft and so warm, so _alive_, burning through even the slightest touch of her fingertips. 

He inhaled sharply and flinched, but flinched into her touch rather than away from it. A pale flush came to his cheeks and a sparkle to his eyes; he hastily moved to wipe away tears.

“I’m sorry,” he said shakily, embarrassed or surprised or simply overwhelmed, “It’s just been… so long…”

“I know,” she said quietly, and started to draw her hand away from his face as if in apology. She could scarcely imagine being alone for so long, never mind without physical contact. But before her touch could leave him he grasped her hand with one of his own, and then it was her turn to lose her breath. His hand was calloused but gentle even in haste, and somehow, she realized it was his bare hand and not a glove. 

“Wait, please,” he breathed, and squeezed his eyes shut, “Don’t stop.” 

His hand eclipsed hers as she cradled his face her palm. His expression showed both tension and relief, brows knit slightly in concentration, in fierce desire to focus on the feeling–she smoothed her thumb along the curve of his cheekbone and his fingers trailed over hers, feeling each valley between her knuckles, following the tendons to her wrist.

Ardbert opened his eyes to look at her again and she swore she had never seen such an expression on anybody’s face in her life. Her lungs felt heavy and her heart ached and beat into every tiny fiber of her being, almost uncomfortably, as if for just a moment her body’s rhythms were out of their normal time and trying to sync with his. 

“This is no coincidence,” he murmured, echoing his words from the tower–the second time he had reached out his hand. His tone was different now, but Alyx couldn’t describe it. This, this tender collision of flesh and the impossible, this moment of comfort between them–this feeling like she had known him all her life or somehow longer, all crystallizing into the lacing of their fingers together, the gentle squeeze, and then, oh–

They were so close now. Alyx could swear they were even _breathing_ in time. Deep and indescribable impulse pulled them together ever more, and she swallowed thickly. He dipped his head slightly toward hers and–

“Ardbert,” she said in a breaking voice. A syncing of breath had become a noted lack of it. His head fell to the crook of her neck, and as he relinquished more of his weight–his impossible, possible nearness–she wrapped him in her arms. 

“I know,” his voice was muffled in her collar. Alyx could no longer tell who was trembling.

_“If you need a push, I’ll be right there behind you; if you lose control, I’ll do my best to stop you.”_

Right now what she needed was to hold him and to be held. It was what they both needed, and they had finally been able to say it.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Love languages are a real thing. It occurred to me several times playing the MSQ how uncomfortable and isolating it would be to find your particular language impossible. (If you know Alyx already from my other writing, you know I'm always stuck on my communication without words bullshit).
> 
> SE please let me hug him.


	2. parallel lines

* * *

How easily they fell in sync, how natural their rhythm. When they were together it was as the movement of involuntary muscles, as easy as blinking, as breathing in and out. Their shared and quickened pulse, the weighted breath in time; the closeness was nearly unbearable in its depth–yet their hearts hammered the demand for more. They were pieces made whole, fragments that fit together perfectly, fractures seeking completion in frenzied harmony of their flesh.

…but _not _flesh. They were as a body and its shadow, mirrored, but never really touching. Parallel lines nearly indiscernible from one another yet never meeting. Any feeling of physical touch was invented by her lonely imagination, by her heart starving for contact. None of it was real, at least not physically. 

Despite the facts–such as they were, the ones that she _had_–some part of it felt like more. This warm and familiar impossibility brought her comfort, if ephemeral. The embrace of a phantom, that’s what it was: invented, created, willed into fraudulent existence by her desire for something other than the heavy emptiness this light had created in her. Despite the facts, in her heart, it felt real.

It felt real enough that Alyx felt guilty dreaming of him.

Ardbert was his own man, after all. He had–past and present tense–his own life, his own dreams and struggles, his own adventures and moments of uncertainty and loneliness. He had a life hauntingly similar to her own, but that did not make it hers. He knew things nobody else could, had experienced things nobody else ever will.

Except for her. 

He was the empathetic shade whose weight she swore she felt shift the mattress. And he was warm, somehow, either truly radiating heat through pure psychic energy or the strength of her imagination. 

“Alyx, is…” his voice was gruff from fatigue. (_Was it? Was he tired? How?_)

“Is this alright?”

She opened her eyes, unmoving. Blinking away spots of light she saw the wide-eyed but tired–yes, tired–concern on his face. He was beside her, not beside her, only a few fulms away. 

“I don’t mean to, well,” he fumbled softly, swallowing, “I know you’re–”

“It’s fine,” she gave him a lopsided smile, shifting her weight. “Just don’t get handsy.”

Arbdert scoffed, clearly flustered and possibly insulted. “I’m not–I would never.” _Not unless you wanted me to_, his fleeting glance seemed to suggest. 

She didn’t, but she wondered if he knew what she was dreaming. She wondered if he knew the bizarre and strangled feeling of wanting him to know but also _never_ to know, both in equal measure–the craving for understanding and the shameful fear of being misconstrued. These dreams were just dreams, same as any others, same as any other creation of her loneliness.

And this, this was just a girl and her shadow: sleeping but not sleeping, touching but not touching, parallel lines together and apart.

* * *


	3. lost, not lost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the burden of guilt.

* * *

Ardbert knew relatively little about Alyx, but he knew the weight she carried. Even in his endless, dreaming purgatory, he could feel the same pressure on the back of his neck. It was the unspoken burden of countless lives and deaths and sometimes, it seemed, time itself. Expectations, dreams, fears, they held them all–such precious cargo in tired hands too few.

The guilt was the heaviest. Even apart from his guilt over the Flood, there was always, _always _guilt over what had been done, and what had not. Ardbert’s past had shaped Alyx’s future, and despite this weight he knew he could not let it hinder them both. He could only look forward, he could only follow her–to the end, whatever shape that end came to take.

_The end_ was an often intangible subject. Things were not always so simple–in fact, as he had come to learn, things were far more complicated than he could explain–but he knew that the _end_ was something Alyx carried. It was, he realized, another kind of guilt, for the concept of the end came with it guilt over what was yet to come, and what could never be.

He knew her burden, and even though he didn’t know her thoughts, somehow he knew what she had been writing. He knew why she had stayed awake, hunched over the desk and struggling to find the words. He knew, too, that when she fell asleep writing (mid-sentence, no doubt), she did so after a long battle with herself not to give in. 

He didn’t know why he knew or even why he could see her now, but Ardbert felt as though, had he any actual effect on the physical world besides whatever strange connection existed between them, this would be the proper time to put a blanket over her shoulders. A jacket. Something. Or perhaps carry her to bed–

No, he’d better not try it.

Her sleep was violently interrupted by another bright act of her body’s rebellion; Alyx did not try to make it to the washroom, but instead resorted to retching in the flower boxes outside her window.

“All right then?” He felt stupid asking. 

She let out a hoarse, mirthless laugh and wiped away the blinding stain on her lips. 

“Been better,” she said. 

Instead of return to her desk, she toppled into bed and hugged herself tightly around her ribs as if she could physically restrain the expanding, burning agony in her chest. She made no comment as to his sudden appearance. Maybe she would assume her sudden awakening would have jostled him as well, pulling him into the room and into her agony unaware of the hours prior. 

“You don’t need that, you know,” he said.

“Pardon?”

“That letter,” he explained. Her too-pale eyes crossed again to where it lay on her desk, then back to meet his–surprise turned into anger, and Alyx’s hands were as claws in the bedclothes. 

“You’re reading my messages now?” she snapped, and Ardbert shook his head.

“I don’t have to read it to know what you wrote.”

Her lips pressed together in a tense line. 

Her voice was icy: low, shaking, full of cracks. “It’s just a letter home.”

“I know what it is, Alyx. It’s your goodbye.”

Her eyes widened, and pulled away from his. She was afraid, desperately afraid. She was afraid of what was happening to her, afraid of what might happen to her. She was afraid of losing herself, of losing control, becoming a monster–she was afraid of death and afraid of begging for it, should the worst happen. 

“It is, isn’t it?” His voice was bitter and harsh despite his intent. “Probably something you’d give to Feo Ul with instruction to deliver if things go bad. Just in case.”

Confession. Apology. Warning. Perhaps instructions, if she had any wealth or possessions worth preserving. A final will and testament, and a statement of regret.

Tears were in her eyes; she spat venom. 

“So what if it is?” Her breast heaved, her teeth clenched. “What’s so bad about preparing for the worst?”

“You’re feeling guilty about things that haven’t even happened yet,” he struggled to control the emotion in his voice. “About losing a battle you haven’t even lost.“

Alyx’s expression softened into weariness. She held her face in her hands, eventually wiping the tears roughly, determinedly, from her eyes. 

"It's…” she began, and tipped back against the pillows, hugging herself again around the ribs, “Getting harder. Harder to believe I am strong enough to win.”

Strong enough to keep control. Strong enough to weather the bright, wicked storm within. Strong enough to end this.

He sat on the end of the bed where she lay, and very gingerly extended his hand. Both of them felt the jolt of awareness when the touch landed, when he made contact.

“If anyone is, you are,” Ardbert said. 

He knew it, somehow, in the very essence of his soul. The guilt weighed heavy, but he knew no better shoulders to carry it. If there was one thing left, one thing he still knew after all he had lost, it was her, and that he would see her battle won.

“Don’t forget,” he said more quietly, and looked away, out the window into the blinding sky, “Don’t forget you’re not alone.”

Alyx said nothing, but placed her hand on top of his.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally published as a prompt response for the ffxivwrite2019 prompt "lost." Definitely the most painful to write... but important.


	4. rejoining

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One brings shadow, one brings light  
One more chapter we've yet to write  
Want for nothing, nothing denied  
Wand'ring ended, futures aligned

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Contains gratuitous Dark Knight references that you may interpret as you see fit.

_“but even if this is our end, it won’t change what we had.”_

-

This is it, he realizes. This is why. This is why Minfillia spared him, why she doomed him to 100 years of nothingness. Why she denied him his sacrifice.

It was so he could make it now, instead. 

He was not whole, neither of them were. They would never be whole just the two of them, either–for what were there, thirteen shards? _Fourteen? _

That kind-voiced giant could see him. He could see them both for what they were, and maybe some of what they were _before_. He knew them when they where whole, long ago. 

If that was true, anyway. Alyx believed him. Ardbert figured he should too. He figured that’s why this whole bloody thing had been so painful here at the end. Maybe some part of them remembered _their_ city burning, _their _star tearing itself apart. Maybe that’s why he could feel the conflict in her heart as she challenged their enemy.

Their friend? Bah, hard to fathom that now.

In the end, Ardbert knew this is why he was here. This is what it had all been for. 

_"If you had to take another step, could you do it?”_

Alyx looked up at him. That’s all she needed was one more step. She was so bloody close. She just needed to hold on for a tiny bit longer. 

She needed to let him do what he was meant to do.

_You need me. _

He helped her stand, he took her hand in his own. She was fading, cracking, pulling apart at every seam. He remembered how powerful he felt when they touched, when their breathing was the same. Not whole, but closer to it. Stronger.

He didn’t know how to help, but all at once he knew he did. He knew what to say even though he didn’t know why. 

_"Listen to my voice,”_ he said in her ear. “_Listen to our heartbeat.”_

She held him tightly. She fought harder than she ever had.

And by the end, through the darkness and blood, they were of one breath, one pulse, one shaking hand lifting the axe. Blinding white communion, perfectly attuned. 

Rejoined.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted for the ffxivwrite2019 prompt "attune." 
> 
> This is it.... for now at least. We'll see. :) Hope you enjoyed. Let me know what you think. And thank you for reading!


	5. a refrain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> one of many scenes from the Pendants

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> told you I wasn't finished. 
> 
> (I'm sorry about the whole "chronological order," thing. Maybe someday I'll go back and rearrange chapters but honestly there's something very honest about how disjointed these pieces are? anyway, this one also originated on tumblr, so you might have seen it before)

-

When Alyx returned to her room in the Pendants, Ardbert was waiting, as he often was. 

“You’re back early,” he observed. “Tired already?”

She made a face, and allowed her posture to slacken somewhat once the door behind her was closed. 

“I wasn’t having much fun,” she answered simply. 

She made short work of her shoes and sighed in relief when her bare feet met the stone floor. Even in such fancy dress--and it was quite something, blue and silver like she was wearing Crystarium windows-- it was as if her entire appearance had changed in seconds: showing her weariness for what it was, regardless of gilt or gossamer. 

She was herself again, only for the room to see.

“No fun, eh? I thought you said you liked dancing.” 

Ardbert watched her sweep through the tiny kitchen to make herself a drink (her usual: gin and lemonade). 

“I love dancing,” she corrected him with a smile, “It was more the company I didn’t care for.”

“Ah.” He wasn’t quite sure what to make of that. He resorted, as he often did, to teasing. “Bunch of cowards, then, was it? No willing partners?”

She laughed.

“Too many,” she said. 

He could absolutely believe that. Even those who didn’t know who she was (unlikely at this point) would have been falling all over themselves simply due to her--

Well, I mean, look at her.

“Everybody wants to dance with the Warrior of Darkness,” she said with a roll of her eyes, “I mean, why wouldn’t they? What an honor. What a _privilege_.” 

Her tone had changed, something wry and a touch bitter grew in her voice even though her smile remained. She busied herself with a knife and loaf of bread, no doubt casting about absently for something to put on it while she continued:

“You’d think I’d be used to it by now, but I’m not,” she said, “It’s no different here. Everybody wants to dance with the Warrior of Darkness, but I’ve no idea if anybody wants to dance with _me._”

(Not even Thancred? Thancred seemed the sort to enjoy dancing. Then again, Ardbert wondered, the Scions may not have even been at this party--had she been all by herself?)

Alyx sighed quietly.

“Did you ever feel that way?” she asked him when she turned around.

“Well,” Ardbert fumbled slightly, “Not about_ dancing_, exactly.”

But he knew. This wasn’t about dancing at all.

“But people acting like they care about you when really all they care about is what they can get from you? Or even just… not quite ever being certain, one way or the other? Aye, I know that.”

Alyx seemed relieved to hear it, but took a rather savage bite of bread crust in lieu of a reply.

“Makes the ones who really do care about you all the more important, in the end,” Ardbert continued, meaning Alyx’s Scion family, and whatever family surely waited for her at home--

As well as the love of his own companions, long gone.

“You’re right,” Alyx said when she finished chewing. She remained thoughtfully silent for another moment or so, but the bitterness had softened from her face. Finally she crossed the room and set down her empty glass with a decisive clunk onto the counter beside the orchestrion. 

“So,” her voice was clear and bright over the wavering crackle of music that spilled into the room, “Want to dance?”

-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> excuse me while I stare threateningly at my waltz playlist on Spotify like _["you stay OUT of this, Tchaikovsky!"](https://youtu.be/a22hVN5UY4M)_


End file.
